


Through The Back Rooms Of The World

by gonnabeanoctopus (Zee)



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Age Difference, Alternate Universe - Fusion, Alternate Universe - X-Men Fusion, Cagefights, Ensemble cast comes later, Evil Grisha, Flashbacks, M/M, Mutants, Road Trips, Runaway Eren Yeager
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-05-27
Updated: 2014-07-11
Packaged: 2018-01-26 18:22:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1698080
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zee/pseuds/gonnabeanoctopus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I saved your life!” </p><p>Wolverine snorted and finally took the cigarette stub from between his lips, taking one last drag before tossing it to the ground and grinding it into the snow with the heel of his boot. “You didn’t, but I guess you can go ahead and keep thinking that if it makes your dick feel bigger.”</p><p>X-men fusion where Levi is Wolverine and Eren is Rogue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> So this starts off pretty similar to the Wolverine-Rogue plotline in X-men (some of the dialogue is verbatim from the movie), but then diverges. Rating is for later chapters.
> 
> General warning for a lot of flashbacks to shitty things that have happened in Eren's life, implications of assault, and some canon-typical violence. Thanks to ouroboros for the beta.

Eren had run out of the few scraps of luck he’d held on to to get himself this far. A Canadian truck stop and a bar in the middle of the night, with the trucker who’d taken him this far walking away with his back turned, clearly done with him. Eren had no idea how he was supposed to find someone to take him for the next leg of his trip, let alone a place to sleep for the night. He was fucked.

He gritted his teeth, pulled his hood up over his head and hoisted his duffel bag over one shoulder, following the guy who’d just given him a ride in the direction of the bar. Eren kept his eyes down, pretending that he couldn’t feel the curious stares from all the hard-looking, older men around him. He stood out like a sore thumb here, where there weren’t any other homeless kids or hitchers. 

He’d been through enough truck stops and shithole small towns by now that he was starting to be able to get a sense of them--some were less shitty than others, but this was one of the shittier ones. Next to the bar was a building that, judging from the women in heels coming to and fro, he could guess was a strip club; behind that was the area where the prostitution and drug deals were going down. A few other men that looked like truckers were milling around outside the entrance to the bar, where Eren was.

It was all familiar, but when he’d found himself in places like this before there was usually a motel or something, somewhere that would take what little money he had in exchange for a bed for the night. Eren couldn’t see any indication of anywhere that would let him spend the night if he couldn’t get a ride out of here.

And he doubted that he’d be able to get a ride out of here. As he lingered outside the bar, he kept catching unfriendly glances from the other men outside. 

Eren didn’t want to ask any of them for a ride; he didn’t want a repeat of what had happened in Nebraska, when he’d accidentally left his would-be assaulter pale and half-dead. Having that asshole’s memories in his head made Eren’s skin crawl. 

The bar was crowded and noisy in a way that Eren hadn’t been expecting--it looked like nothing from outside, but once he got in the door he was caught up in a press of yelling, sweaty men. Eren had to swallow down panic as he got jostled around, keeping his hands out in front of him and his head ducked as much as possible to prevent anyone from accidentally brushing the exposed skin of his face. 

Before his mutation manifested, Eren couldn’t recall ever even noticing how crowded a place was, as long as he had room to breathe. But now that he was one of _them_ , crowds were a nightmare. 

By the time he’d finally carved out some space to stand and breathe, he’d been shoved close to the front of the crowd. Eren glanced up to see what all these assholes were looking at. 

It was a crude, caged fighting ring. There was a platform set a few feet up off the ground, only big enough for two people to fight in. As Eren glanced up, the door to the cage clanged open, and a bar employee half-carried a beaten-looking man out of it. Within the cage, the announcer was holding up the hand of the man who was presumably the victor.

“He’s done it again! Are we going to let this stand?” The man was red-faced and yelling into his mic, shaking the wrist he held for emphasis. “Who’s next? Who’s man enough to take on The Wolverine?”

The man (Wolverine, apparently) jerked his wrist out of the announcer’s grip and stepped away, his lip curling. The crowd roared as the announcer continued to work them up, but no one seemed to be in a hurry to volunteer, despite Wolverine’s short stature--he probably weighed just half of some of the burliest men in the audience. He also seemed entirely disinterested in what the announcer was saying, despite the fact that everyone in the bar seemed to be dying for him to get beat down. Wolverine was sweaty and breathing hard, but showed no other sign that he had just been in a fight; he was now leaning back against the bars of the cage with his thumbs hooked in his belt loops, his face utterly impassive. 

When the next volunteer finally shoved his way to the front and stepped inside the cage, Eren felt a twinge of sympathy: he was about to witness a total massacre. The challenger was a roided-out giant of a man, and while Wolverine seemed built in a wiry sort of way, his waist was also roughly the same width as his opponent’s bicep. 

This was going to be ugly. Eren wanted to look away, maybe go over to get some water at the bar or something, but there was no way he’d get through the crush of people, and anyway it felt cowardly somehow to look away. The announcer was now holding up the challenger’s wrist in the same way he had Wolverine’s, informing the crowd that this was Brad, and Brad was more than ready to take Wolverine down. 

Wolverine’s facial expression didn’t change as the opponent approached him. He pushed away from the bars, cracked his neck and gave the announcer a nod to indicate that he was ready. His eyes scanned the crowd and seemed to pause on Eren’s face. Eren looked back and wondered if it was just his imagination that Wolverine was meeting his eyes. He felt a strange sense of--of something, not quite deja-vu but some kind of recognition, some whisper of familiarity that pricked the back of his neck. Wolverine didn’t look away until the buzzer blared, turning to face his opponent almost casually, just in time to catch a fist in his jaw. 

Eren’s cry of sympathy was drowned out by the screams of the crowd. The force of the blow knocked Wolverine into the bars in front of Eren’s face, close enough that Eren could see the blood spray from his mouth. His opponent immediately came at him with a punch to the gut, and when Wolverine fell to his hands and knees he was kicked, twice in the ribs and then once, deliberately, in the groin. 

It was awful to watch. Wolverine let out a grunt of pain when he was kicked in the balls, rolling over into a fetal position. All Eren could do was stare helplessly at the back of Wolverine’s head, where his hair was buzzed close to his neck. Why didn’t he even fight back? Sure, he was small and had no chance of winning, but surely anything would be better than just taking this. 

The opponent, at least, had paused in his beating to take a victory lap around the edge of the cage. The crowd was salivating for this, they wanted to see Wolverine not just defeated but broken and humiliated. There was something here that Eren had missed, something had sparked the crowd’s alarmingly sadistic hatred of the small, crumpled figure in the cage. Eren didn’t know what Wolverine could possibly have done to make them hate him so much, but Eren hated them all right back, hated them as passionately as if he were the one getting beaten senseless in that cage instead of this stranger. 

While his opponent was distracted by hamming it up for the audience, Wolverine slowly began to move. He rolled over until he was facing the cage wall and began getting to his feet. He was up on one knee, his hands braced against the wall, by the time his opponent noticed that he was still showing signs of life. He leered and sauntered back over, and oh fuck, he was aiming a kick right at Wolverine’s temple, surely a move that dangerous couldn’t be allowed? Not that the announcer was going to step in; Eren had a sudden, awful vision of the fight continuing until Wolverine’s body was nothing but bloody pulp on the ground, murdered while Eren did nothing but watch.

As the brute’s foot lashed out, Wolverine moved faster than Eren’s eyes could track. He held up a forearm and blocked the kick, and his opponent reacted as if he’d kicked a concrete wall, staggering back on his other foot with a high-pitched yelp of pain. As Wolverine stood, his expression seemed just barely more annoyed than the indifference he’d shown at the beginning of the fight. He cracked his neck again before turning to face his opponent, moving like he was in no hurry at all. 

The rest of the fight seemed to happen in slow motion. Wolverine’s opponent came at him again, his punches now wild and badly aimed, easily dodged. As Wolverine ducked down beneath his opponent’s swing, his fist came up in a diagonal hook, hitting the other man right below his armpit. The flinch of his opponent left his face open, and the second punch from Wolverine’s left side was a clear head shot, the loud crack of the impact ringing through the bar.

Brad fell to the floor. Wolverine wandered over to him, his stride so casual it was almost lazy, heedless of the noise of the crowd around him. He used his boot to turn the man over on his back and glanced at the announcer, as if to say it was clear that Brad was finished. The announcer, clearly disappointed, yelled out Wolverine’s name for the crowd. Wolverine didn’t respond to his victory, just rolled his eyes and went back to leaning against the cage wall. 

Eren’s heart was hammering in his chest. He squeezed his eyes shut and stumbled back, his body moving on automatic to get him as far away from the scene in the cage as possible. The way Wolverine had moved and fought seemed more than human, and the only other time Eren had seen anything like it was--oh god, he didn’t want to remember this now, didn’t want to see the memories flashing brightly in front of the black of his closed eyelids, but there it was: he was ten years old again, small and helpless as the reptilian mutant moved too fast for him to see or stop and ripped into his mother in front of him, inhuman claws opening her up from her belly to her neck. 

Eren made it to the bar, his body landing heavily on a stool. The noise of the crowd was still all he could hear, but the round he’d witnessed must have been the last one, because people were dispersing now. Eren was sweating so hard that his hands felt clammy inside his gloves, and he had to push down the usual impulse to take them off. 

He couldn’t stop replaying the fight in his mind, couldn’t stop thinking about the way Wolverine had moved, the sheer speed on display when he’d gone from being prone and broken on the floor to dominating the fight. It was all the proof that Eren needed. That was a mutant back there, same as the one who’d murdered his mother (same as himself, but Eren pushed that thought viciously down). 

That cage fight had made him afraid at first, but fury and hate were now chasing down the panic inside him. He was shaking with the desire to find Wolverine and take his gloves off, wrap his hands around that freak’s throat and feel the life drain away. Eren had never ever wanted to actually use the sickness inside him against someone, but he figured that using it to take out another fucking abomination was the only positive thing that could ever come of his own mutation.

Eren looked down to see that his hands were clutching the edge of the bar, his knuckles white. He let go quickly, pulling his hands into his lap and glancing around to see if anyone had noticed, but none of the other patrons were looking at him. It was Last Call, and all the other truckers were either slugging down one last beer or paying their tabs. 

“Kid? Can I help you?”

The bartender had noticed Eren. Eren swallowed, reminding himself that the drinking age here was nineteen, only two years away from his current age--so maybe his illegality wasn’t quite as obvious as it would have been in the U.S. The look on the bartender’s face said that no way was Eren getting anything alcoholic tonight, but at least he probably wouldn’t get kicked out. 

“Just water,” Eren mumbled. 

He stayed in his seat as the bar emptied out around him, until it was just him at the bar, the staff cleaning up, and a few other patrons asleep on various surfaces around the place. Now that the anger was draining from him, Eren was remembering that he still had the very immediate problem of where he was going to spend the night--not to mention how he was going to get his next meal, as his empty stomach was reminding him. None of the people around him looked like they were in a sympathetic mood; the bartender kept looking at him and then nudging the tip jar further out of his reach.

This was nothing compared to the suspicion he would get if they knew what he really was. Eren sipped his water and tried to keep the worry he felt from showing on his face.

Eren felt suddenly aware of a presence behind him, and he knew it was Wolverine before he’d even glanced over his shoulder to see him there, walking up to the bar. The tank top he’d fought in was now covered by a bulky, battered leather jacket, and there was a lit cigarette in his mouth. Looking at him now, Eren couldn’t believe he’d ever thought that Wolverine had looked small or weak: sure, he was short, but he moved with the uncaring confidence of someone who was utterly unafraid for himself. 

“I’ll have a beer,” Wolverine said as he took a seat a few bar stools down. Then he turned deliberately to Eren, meeting his eyes. “And for you? Want anything?”

It took a moment for Eren to find his voice. “--uh. What?”

Wolverine raised an eyebrow pointedly and finally took the cigarette out of his mouth, blowing smoke in Eren’s direction. “I assumed you were staring because you wanted me to buy you a drink. No? Then stick your eyes back in your fucking head and stop looking at me like I’ve made you shit your pants.”

Eren felt his face get hot. He turned away to stare back down at his glass, his teeth grinding together. He didn’t want to just take the sneering comment, he wanted to lash out and demand that Wolverine admit to being a mutant freak. He wanted to start a fight and he wanted to know more.

The last song that had been playing on the jukebox ended, and a new one didn’t start--the place was closing down. The only noise now came from the news on the TV. Eren hadn’t been paying attention, but then he heard the news anchor say something about an anti-mutant rally, and Eren couldn’t stop himself from looking up as he heard it. He looked away just as sharply, because he knew he couldn’t do this, couldn’t let anyone around him start thinking that maybe he showed any kind of special interest in the mutant issue. 

When he looked away from the screen, Eren found himself meeting Wolverine’s eyes again, and he realized that Wolverine had just gone through the exact same motions: looking up instinctively when the news discussed mutants, then looking away in an attempt to avoid giving someone the wrong idea. 

The look in Wolverine’s eyes was different when he looked at Eren now. There was something almost like a question there, and Eren felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up before Wolverine finally looked back down at his drink, frowning. 

The rally on TV was taking place in San Francisco, due to the city’s landmark passing of pro-mutant rights legislation. The news was now focusing on the man speaking at the rally, yelling into a megaphone, and Eren felt a jolt of recognition: he’d seen Senator Kelly speaking at one of the rallies he’d attended last year--or it might have been the year before, he wasn’t sure. The years he’d spent pledging himself to the anti-mutant cause felt like a blur now, a time in his life that had been so uncomplicated compared to where he was now that those actions might as well have been taken by a different person entirely. The cause was still in his heart, a hate that burned when he thought about mutants or remembered his mother or looked down at his own hands, but threads of bitterness and doubt now ran through the black shape of his old convictions. 

The noise of footsteps to his left snapped Eren back to the present. Brad was here, with one of his friends shadowing him. As Eren glanced over, he saw Brad tapping Wolverine on the shoulder. “Hey. You owe me some money.”

Wolverine took a drag on his cigarette and didn’t reply. The ugly look on Brad’s bruised face grew uglier. 

“No man takes a beating like that with nothing to show for it.” 

Wolverine snorted, barely turning his head to acknowledge the person speaking to him. “Obviously you don’t hit as hard as you think you do.”

It was probably the worst thing Wolverine could have said at the moment. Eren watched nervously as Brad clenched his hand into a fist, the oversized muscles in his neck and shoulders bunching up. He took a step closer and leaned in until he was speaking in Wolverine’s ear, but Eren could still hear what he said.

“I know what you are.”

Wolverine took the cigarette out of his mouth to ash it, blowing smoke sideways in the direction of Brad’s face. He still hadn’t turned around to face him. “Who gives a fuck what you know? I happen to know that you’re an idiot who doesn’t know when to walk away before more than his dignity gets damaged, but you don’t see me bragging about my basic deductive reasoning skills.” 

His voice was still casual, but the threat was impossible to miss. It was like watching a rabbit mindlessly hop closer to a bird of prey, oblivious to the slaughter that was about to come, and it was horrible to watch. Eren found himself gripping the edge of his glove on automatic, ready to peel it off if he needed to intervene. Wolverine was a violent mutant and Brad was not, and even if Brad was too stupid to realize it, he was in horrible danger. Sure, Brad seemed like an asshole, but he was still probably someone’s brother or father or whatever, and he didn’t deserve to get murdered by a mutant freak like Wolverine.

Brad’s friend seemed to be at least slightly more cognizant of the situation. He tugged on Brad’s sleeve, muttering something about how it wasn’t worth it, and at first Brad let him, following his friend to walk away. But then he stopped, twisting back around toward Wolverine, and Eren saw the flash of a knife in his hand--

“Look out!” Eren yelled in the split second before Brad lunged at Wolverine’s back. (Fuck, why had Eren yelled and warned him? He’d _known_ that Wolverine was the dangerous one here, not Brad.) Wolverine moved at the sound of Eren’s voice, and if Eren had thought that he moved fast while fighting in the cage, it was nothing to the speed he displayed now. 

Wolverine was instantly out of his seat and slamming Brad back against the wall. He held his fist to Brad’s throat and, as Eren watched in horror, two gleaming metal claws emerged from his knuckles to bracket Brad’s neck. A third claw came out between them, sliding slowly out of Wolverine’s hand with a slick noise that made Eren’s stomach churn. The claw’s point stopped just short of Brad’s adam’s apple. 

In the hushed silence of the bar, the click of a rifle being cocked was loud and impossible to miss. Wolverine glanced back, an acknowledgment of the rifle that the bartender was pressing into the nape of his neck.

“Get out of my bar, freak.” 

For a few long moments, the tableau in front of Eren remained completely still. Then Wolverine moved again, and now the rifle was in pieces on the floor, his second set of claws having sliced it in two before the bartender could get a shot off. The claws of his right hand were still at Brad’s throat and now his left arm reached out on his other side, holding the other set of claws steady just a few inches in front of the bartender’s nose. The look on Wolverine’s face was horrible, his teeth bared in a snarl and his eyes narrowed and savage. 

Eren could hardly breathe. He felt frozen by an animal dread, a blackness in his chest and behind his eyes that was trying to take over. All he could think about was the bloody mess that had been all that was left of his mother after the mutant cut her open again and again. That was going to happen again right here, right in front of him, this mutant was going to slice these people into ribbons while Eren was helpless to stop him. He couldn’t be stopped, couldn’t be reasoned with, he was more monster than human--

The claws disappeared as suddenly as they’d first come out, retracting back into Wolverine’s hands with a soft _snikt._ His hands dropped back to his sides, he blinked and his face was no longer a horrible mask of violent intent. When he went to grab his lit cigarette from where he’d left it in the ashtray, the bartender flinched, and Wolverine’s mouth twisted into the same derisive sneer he’d showed when the announcer had grabbed his wrist in the cage.

Wolverine walked out the front door, slow enough to make it clear that he was only leaving because he wanted to, not because of any threat. Eren stared after him, his gaze fixating on the sharp angle made by the shoulders of his jacket. 

Wolverine hadn’t killed anyone. He could have--the way he moved, he could have easily slit the throat of every remaining person in the bar before anyone even managed to call the cops. But he hadn’t, he hadn’t even hurt Brad or the bartender, despite both of them threatening his life. 

Eren was following Wolverine out before the thought had even occurred to his conscious mind. The cold hit him like a semi-truck as soon as he stepped out, and it was late now, so very late at night, and Eren didn’t know what it was he was reaching for but he knew he didn’t like his chances if he failed to grasp it. 

“Hey!” It was just Eren’s imagination, he knew, but being able to see the puff of his breath in the air made him think for a moment that he could see his shout fly through the air towards Wolverine’s back.

Wolverine glanced over his shoulder but kept walking. “Whatever it is you want, I don’t care.” 

Eren broke into a run to catch up with him. At the last moment he managed to stop himself from catching Wolverine by the arm, realizing that it couldn’t be a great idea to surprise the guy by grabbing him. 

“Take me with you.”

Now Wolverine stopped, turning to face Eren. He still had the cigarette clamped in the corner of his mouth. “Huh. I’m intrigued enough by your idiocy to ask why.”

Eren swallowed. Fuck, why _had_ he thought this was a good idea? Wolverine was a mutant and Eren hated mutants, had sworn on his mother’s life that he would fight against them. And Wolverine had just proved, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that he was dangerous. He was living, breathing proof of why the world would be better off without mutants.

 _But so are you,_ a voice whispered inside his head. _And would you have even been that merciful in his place?_

As Eren failed to come up with an answer to his question, Wolverine rolled his eyes and began walking again, faster this time and heading in the direction of the truck stop parking lot. But Eren’s legs were longer than his, and he didn’t have to struggle to keep up. 

“Because I need a ride! Even if you can’t take me far, I just need to get somewhere more populated, somewhere where I can get some work for a while.”

“Sorry, can’t help you,” Wolverine said, not even looking in Eren’s direction anymore. 

Eren couldn’t fucking believe that he was reduced to this, begging someone that he’d loathed just a few minutes ago for help. But while Wolverine’s mutation made him terrifying, somehow Eren wasn’t terrified but desperate instead. 

“I saved your life!” 

Wolverine snorted and finally took the cigarette stub from between his lips, taking one last drag before tossing it to the ground and grinding it into the snow with the heel of his boot. “You didn’t, but I guess you can go ahead and keep thinking that if it makes your dick feel bigger.”

Eren refused to blush at that. Wolverine had come to a stop now, beside a small trailer that Eren assumed must be his. This was it, his last shot at convincing Wolverine to bring him along, and Eren had no idea why he needed this to happen so desperately, but he didn’t want to be left alone in an unfriendly bar in rural Canada (what province was this godforsaken place even in?). He had somehow managed to not think about it, he’d kept fear at bay since the day he’d decided to run away from his father. But now there was someone that, for some reason that didn’t even make sense in his own brain, he wanted to trust--and realizing he felt something close to safe around Wolverine made him feel how unsafe the rest of his world had become. 

This time Eren didn’t keep himself from reaching out to touch Wolverine’s arm, tugging him around so they were face-to-face. Wolverine tensed up, but Eren didn’t get thrown across the parking lot for daring to grab him. 

“Where else am I supposed to go?” The words came out far more raw than Eren had intended, and he swallowed hard when he looked up at Wolverine’s face. Wolverine looked away almost immediately, his eyes cutting to the side as he frowned, but Eren didn’t break his gaze. 

“I don’t know why you think I’d care.” Wolverine was clearly trying to make his voice sound as unfeeling as it had just a minute before, but there was something in it that made Eren hope.

“I have to go with you. Just--just please take me with you.” Eren didn’t know what else to say. Maybe it would be more convincing if he could just tell Wolverine what he was, tell him that he knew what it was like to be a freak, but Eren couldn’t even think those words, let alone say them. All he could do was beg.

Wolverine was stiff for a moment before he finally shook Eren off, glaring at him and taking a step back. “I’m dropping you off one town over, and if it’s even shittier than this spot then you’re shit out of luck.”

“Yeah! Yeah, sure, that’s fine,” Eren said, hurying to the passenger side of the truck before Wolverine could possibly change his mind. He was too afraid to say anything and possibly break whatever spell had made Wolverine relent. He got in the cab of the truck and stared out the window as Wolverine grumpily climbed into the driver’s seat, and he didn’t let out the breath he was holding until they were back out on the highway.

The cab of the truck remained quiet while Eren watched the snowy pine trees race by on either side of the road. He didn’t know how far this stretch of highway went, didn’t know how much time he had until they reached the next town and Wolverine kicked him out of the truck. He rested his forehead against the freezing glass of the window pane and wondered what he should say to break the silence that had settled in, or if he should say anything at all.

When Eren woke up, the sky was starting to get light. He jerked upright in his seat, and immediately felt for his gloves (still on his hands, thank God), his heart racing before he remembered where he was. But that didn’t make it better: no matter how tired he’d been, how had he let his guard down so much? He’d taken so many rides with strange men since leaving home, but this was the first time he’d ever let himself fall asleep while one drove.

“I think you were drooling,” Wolverine said. “I hope I don’t find any spittle on my upholstery later.” 

“I wasn’t,” Eren muttered, wiping at his mouth reflexively. “How long was I out?”

Wolverine shrugged a shoulder. “How should I know? A few hours. Maybe two, maybe four. It’s not like the clock in this piece of shit truck is at all functional.”

Eren looked down at his hands. Fuck, his heart was racing. “And how long until we reach the next town?”

Watching Wolverine out of the corner of his eye, Eren saw his eyes narrow and the corners of his mouth pull just slightly down. “Shut up.”

Eren was confused by that, but maybe it was good? Either Wolverine was pissed because the closest town to the bar where they’d met was farther than he’d thought, or--Eren didn’t want to let himself hope for this, but it seemed possible--he had decided to let Eren stay with him for longer. 

Now that he was properly awake, it felt more awkward for the two of them to be sitting here and not talking. Eren shifted in his seat, turning over his shoulder to look at the trailer behind the truck cab. It was spartan and neat, with a cot folded against the wall and two duffel bags tucked in the corner; it didn’t really look used. “Uh, do you live out of this thing?”

“You sound a bit judgmental for a teenager who just bummed a ride from a stranger in a parking lot.”

“No! Sorry, I mean, I didn’t mean to sound judgmental, I just, uh--” Eren grit his teeth to keep himself from saying anything else dumb. Why had this seemed like such a good idea again? 

Wolverine sighed, finally looking over at Eren. “Yes, I live out of my truck and my only source of income is never losing a fight. That can’t actually come as a surprise to you.”

Eren swallowed. He didn’t want to say that no, it definitely wasn’t a surprise, because that seemed insulting somehow. “Do you have anything to eat?”

He regretted asking immediately, because in response Wolverine leaned over him, reaching to open the glove compartment. It was the most anyone had invaded Eren’s personal space since the man he’d nearly killed in Nebraska, and he jerked back automatically, his back pressing against his seat in an attempt to get himself as far away as possible. Wolverine noticed, paused and sat back in his seat, giving Eren an irritated sigh. "Look kid, I'm not gonna hurt you."

"What? I--I didn't think you were," Eren said, spluttering and speaking too fast to try and cover for the strangeness of his reaction.

"Its fine," Wolverine said, clearly unconvinced, although Eren hadn’t been lying. He looked away, his face clouding over. “But if you’re smart enough to be afraid of me, I don’t get why you were stupid enough to cling to me like a fucking barnacle in the first place.”

Eren swallowed. He’d said something wrong, and Wolverine almost seemed to be hurt by it, which was--surprising, and difficult for Eren to wrap his head around.

“I’m not afraid of you,” he said. “It’s just that--when people touch my skin, something happens.” 

“Like what?” Wolverine asked.

Memories seeped up from where he’d buried them, memories of lives that weren’t his: the first and only girl that Eren ever kissed (Amy, her name was Amy) going to a birthday party in elementary school; that trucker in Nebraska paying a stripper to dance on his lap. The parts he stole from other people usually started to fade from his mind a week after they touched him, but some things stayed. 

“I don’t know. They just get hurt.”

It was the first time Eren had told anyone about this willingly. His father knew, but that was only because his father had been there, had been the one to call 911 when Amy went into a seizure on Eren’s bed on the day the mutation manifested. Grisha had warned him not to tell anyone else, but apparently that didn’t include the good doctor’s lab team, because they clearly knew the story when Grisha took Eren in to be examined the next day. Eren had let them poke and prod and draw his blood and take scans of his brain; he’d even willingly pressed his fingers against the skin of a lab rat--nothing had happened when he did this, and when Eren realized after the fact that the scientists had expected the rat to die, he’d wanted to throw up. 

On the drive back to their home, Grisha had discussed the necessity of taking Eren out of school and getting him a suite of rooms in the compound where Grisha worked, so that he could be monitored. Grisha was quick to assure Eren that his safety and privacy would be the top priority, even though Eren hadn’t objected. Eren didn’t object to any of it, simply nodded and kept his head down until they pulled up to the driveway of the house that he would no longer be living in. 

Eren had packed his bag that night. He had a little cash from the job he’d worked over the summer, and he also helped himself to what little cash Grisha kept in his wallet. Eren had never asked his father any questions about his work, had never thought too deeply about what his scientist father did all day, but he’d known it was strange, and he’d thought it might be dangerous. If he had stayed and let them take him back to that lab then he would have been trapped, and even though it was probably what a monster like him deserved, some survival instinct had taken control of his limbs and gotten him out of that house and away from his father.

Grisha was still looking for him, though. Eren had googled himself, and his face and his name were now on milk cartons or wherever it was that missing kids’ names went these days. He thought about it every time he went somewhere public, any time he had to ask for a ride. He avoided police cars these days. 

“Good to know,” was all Wolverine said to Eren’s confession, and when Eren met his eyes it was a few seconds before he looked back out at the road. 

Eren sucked in a breath. Wolverine didn’t seem like he was about to throw Eren out of his truck, at least. And he realized--he’d never introduced himself. “I’m Rogue.” 

Wolverine snorted. “Really? Because you’re a runaway, right? Was that really the best name you could come up with?”

Eren felt a flush of anger, and forgot to be worried about Wolverine possibly rejecting him. “I don’t know. Was Wolverine the best _you_ could come up with?”

Wolverine’s head gave a small shake, the movement almost too fast for Eren to catch, and then he touched something on his chest (a necklace--no, dog tags?) briefly before placing his hand quickly back on the wheel. 

“Levi.”

It took a moment for Eren to realize what he’d just been given. He swallowed hard, his chest constricted in a reaction that seemed--extreme for just hearing someone’s name for the first time. “Eren.”

Levi met his eyes again, acknowledging it. Eren couldn’t help it: he was smiling, and he turned his face away to look out the window instead. Levi. Neither of them had last names to share, and somehow knowing this made Eren feel better about his own situation. 

Levi cleared his throat, for the first time looking like he felt sort of awkward. "There's some beef jerky in the glove compartment. You can help yourself, if you want."

"Thanks," Eren said, already into the compartment and grabbing for the jerky. Eren was starving, he hadn’t eaten anything since a gas station hot dog yesterday morning. He yanked his gloves off and started stuffing his face, too hungry to care that he probably looked ridiculous. Next to him, Levi sighed.

“You’re going to make a mess,” he said, the line of his mouth pulling grumpily to the side. Eren winced and hurried to gulp down the huge bite he’d taken. He nearly choked. 

“I won’t!” Eren said, indignant, because was it even really possible to make a mess eating beef jerky? It wasn’t as if it was the kind of food you could spill. 

“There are crumbs,” Levi said, giving Eren’s lap a pointed look. “Just be careful, that’s all.”

“If you don’t want me eating in your truck, we could stop somewhere and eat,” Eren suggested. “Although I barely have any cash… shit um, not that I’m asking you to buy me dinner! That’s not what I meant, I swear.”

Levi just laughed at him. “Even if you were angling for a free dinner in the lamest, most obvious way possible, your plea would fall on deaf ears. Do I really look like I’m rolling in enough cash to be handing out free meals?”

“Uh…” 

Levi gave him a sharp look, and fuck, Eren really hated how much he was blushing. “Stop looking for a polite answer when there isn’t one, and just shut up.”

Eren nodded and looked down at his lap, busying himself with more beef jerky. Every time he thought that maybe Levi was becoming more friendly to him, Levi said something to ruin any semblance of niceness. It was discouraging. 

They passed another mileage sign, and this one said they were only thirty kilometers away from the nearest town. Eren didn’t want to say anything about this, didn’t want to say anything at all in fact, since Levi seemed to think that everything he said was dumb. They drove on in silence.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "You’re a runaway mutant with a serious case of shitty luck, I’m not just gonna drop you off at a rest stop."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Adding more characters with this chapter! And diverging more from the plot of the X-men movies.

Conversation in the truck was dead for the last five miles into town. Once they passed the town limits, Eren was so distracted by trying not to show how miserable he was at the prospect of being left at another rest stop that he didn’t notice where they were going until Levi pulled up into the parking lot of a Motel 6. 

“Wait,” Eren said. “What are we--why are we at a motel?”

“Good job asking questions now and not hours ago,” Levi said, deadpan. “You’ve got killer survival instincts, you know that?”

Eren tensed and grabbed his left hand with his right, ready to take off his glove. 

“Oh stop that, jesus, it was just a tasteless joke.” Now Levi was sighing and leaning back in his chair, the engine still running.

“A tasteless joke,” Eren repeated, the adrenaline rush leaving his body numb. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

Levi glanced at Eren and then cut his eyes away, scowling. “Sorry. I just meant that we passed the ‘nearest town’ to our last shithole miles ago. You’re a runaway mutant with a serious case of shitty luck, I’m not just gonna drop you off at a rest stop. In another fifty miles there’s a bar that pays me as good as I can get for fighting, but right now I’m fucking exhausted and need some shut-eye.”

Eren tried to follow what Levi was saying. Was he inviting Eren along? Or… what? He kept his hands together, his right hand holding his left wrist. It would probably be faster to get his gloves off then to get out of the truck, if it came down to it. When he spoke, his voice came out loud and a little hoarse. “So what, you’re thinking that we share a motel room for the night? Just get cozy with each other?”

Levi looked pointedly down at Eren’s gloved hands, then out the window. “No, idiot. I’m not looking for anything like that. The motel room’s for you, I’ll sleep in the trailer. It’s what it’s fucking there for.”

Eren hesitated. This was Levi telling Eren that he could stay with him for the long term--or at least, for longer than a few hours. This was what Eren knew, on some level, he’d been hoping for since asking Levi to take him with him. But Levi just assuming that Eren would want to stay with him--that made Eren want to run again.

As Eren hesitated, Levi held out his hand, palm up. “If you’re gonna zap me, just get it over with. I won’t stop you. I’m curious how much your thing hurts.”

“Fuck you,” Eren said reflexively, pissed at the insinuation that his mutation was less deadly or painful than Levi’s. The corner of Levi’s mouth twitched, but he didn’t remove his hand.

“I’m just saying, you still have a choice to trust me or not. But I’m sick of you being so skittish, so make a decision now and stick with it.”

Eren swallowed, and let go of his own wrist. “Would you be paying for the motel room?”

“And still with the stupid questions.”

Eren ground his teeth. He was getting sick of Levi mocking him at every turn. He hadn’t been this mean just a few minutes ago, when they were still on the road. Something about being back in civilization seemed to have made Levi immediately harder, like he wore armor made of harsh sarcasm whenever he was back around humans.

The desire to get under Levi’s skin again made Eren reckless. “Well, if you’re going to be the one paying for the room, then you should get to sleep in it. We can share it,” he said.

Now Levi was the one hesitating, surprised and off-balance. “I’m not some creep who wants to share a room with a teenager. No thanks.”

Eren was sick of this. With a sigh he unlatched his door and got out of the truck, stretching when his feet hit the ground. The cold was almost welcome after hours of the stale air in the truck cab. “The alternative is sleeping in your own truck, which is really depressing. And I don’t have cash to steal and it’s not like you could try anything without getting your soul sucked out, so I’m not really worried.”

“Maybe I’m worried about _you_ trying something,” Levi grumbled, and Eren smiled. That sounded like Levi giving in.

Eren stayed in the truck while Levi checked them in, because an older guy traveling with a teenager was suspicious enough as it is without the probability that Eren was still on missing persons lists. 

They got a room with two double beds. As soon as they unlocked their room, Levi headed for one of the beds. “I’m fucking exhausted,” he said, shucking his jacket and unbuckling his pants. “You can do whatever but I’m crashing.”

It didn't seem to take Levi any time at all to fall asleep. Eren, on the other hand, felt plenty rested from all the naps he'd taken in the truck. He itched to go somewhere, do something, but he knew it was a bad idea to leave the motel.

The room stank of old cigarettes and Levi wasn't quite snoring, but he was getting close. Eren couldn't stay put. 

He took off walking along the motel landing, going from one end to the other and then back. It got him strange looks from housekeeping, but at least he was neither in a truck nor in the street. 

Now that he had some room to breathe, he couldn't get images of Levi out of his head. Levi wasn't only the first person who'd shown him kindness, he was also fascinating. Eren remembered the way he'd moved in the ring, a speed that seemed impossible with the amount of brute force he'd brought to the fight.

And he wasn't handsome, not in a conventional sense, but--there was something arresting about him. Eren felt his cheeks grow warm as his memories lingered on the way Levi had looked shirtless, and the profile of his face in the truck. 

So he was attracted to him--so what? The realization made Eren feel belligerent, as if someone was telling him he wasn’t _allowed_ to be attracted to Levi. And if Eren was honest with himself, this hypothetical someone was right: it was wrong for Eren to be attracted to anyone with his condition; wrong to think about anything like that when the slightest contact could kill anyone unfortunate enough to be wanted by him.

But what if Levi could take it? a thought whispered in a dark corner of his mind. Eren shivered. Levi was strong, and Levi could heal. Hell, just minutes ago Levi had held a hand out and asked Eren to touch him just so he could see how it felt. Was it so crazy to imagine that maybe, just maybe Levi could be all right after touching Eren? And was it crazy to think that maybe someday he might want Eren to--

To do what? Eren didn’t let his mind go there. But it was a tempting, tortuous train of thought. 

When he ended up back at the hotel room, he wasn’t sure if the walking had helped his restlessness at all--sleep still felt far off. But Levi had gotten this motel room for his sake, otherwise he’d be sleeping in his trailer, so Eren felt like he needed to at least try to sleep.  
But when he let himself back into the room, Levi wasn’t asleep--or at least, that was what Eren first thought, because he was arched off the bed and making a horrible sound, a sound that made the hairs on Eren’s arms stand up. Then he slumped back down, and Eren saw that his eyes were closed. 

Holy shit, this looked far away from any nightmare that Eren had ever experienced. Levi was thrashing and moaning, the lines of his face contorted with pain, and as Eren crossed the room he saw that Levi’s forehead was slick with sweat. 

The sight squeezed at Eren’s heart--he’d only just barely met Levi, but he was the only one who’d been kind to Eren since he ran away, and it wasn’t humane to let Levi continue sleeping through something like this. Eren called out his name, but Levi didn’t react at all. So Eren approached him, nervous but determined to pull Levi out of the possessed state he was trapped in. When he leaned over and shook Levi by the shoulder as gently as he could, Levi’s eyes immediately snapped open.

The noise that Levi made was the farthest thing from human that Eren had ever heard. Eren heard the guttural roar and then felt a bright slash of pain as one set of Levi’s claws embedded themselves in his chest.

For a moment their eyes met, Levi’s savage and Eren’s shocked. Then Levi’s eyes widened and his face went slack with horror as he realized what he’d done, and Eren felt the claws slide slickly out of his skin.

The wound was below his left collarbone. Had it gotten his heart? Eren had no idea, but he could hear the gurgling noises he was making as if they were coming from someone else entirely. He had very little time, and his body must be going into shock because he could barely feel the pain now and moving was near impossible. He didn’t think he could get his gloves off, not when he could barely move his arms--

“Oh fuck,” Levi was saying, his voice scared and high. “Oh god, Eren--help, somebody _help me!_ ”

Levi was shouting, but Eren doubted anyone would come to save him. They were mutants: anyone in the hotel that came was going to see that and react with hatred--there was no point, he was going to be killed by a mutant--was this how his mother felt, when that monster had ripped her to shreds?

 _But you’re not your mother,_ a voice reminded him. And Eren knew this was true: he wasn’t his mother, wasn’t human, wasn’t helpless. All he could do right now was fall forward onto Levi, so he did, and Levi caught him, cradled him, and didn’t resist when Eren pressed his forehead against Levi’s. 

The flood of memories and power was immediate. Distantly, Eren heard Levi’s cry of surprise and pain, but either he couldn’t pull away or he chose not to, because the connection held. 

Eren felt Levi’s healing power course through him, finding the wound in his chest and making pain sear brightly through his brain as his flesh knit itself back together. Then there were the memories, coming at him so fast that they immediately felt like his own and not a stranger’s: He was in a tank, there were needles stabbing all the way through him, he was in pain; he was out of the tank and his claws were ripping through flesh, and he was consumed with rage and a lust for blood; he was holding someone’s body and grieving--

It was too much, the images and sounds and feelings ran together in one long white scream in Eren’s brain. He could feel, dimly, that his shoulder was healed, but the intensity of the stream of everything he was getting from Levi took away any agency he had to break the connection. There was an invisible thread knotting their heads together, and if it was painful for Eren then he knew it must be a thousand times worse for Levi. Eren struggled to stop, but he couldn’t.

Then just as suddenly as they had begun, the flow of memories and power stopped. A hand was pulling Eren back, and Eren caught a glimpse of someone’s face--blonde, older, stern blue eyes--and then the same someone’s fingers touched Eren’s forehead, and the world went dark.

***

Eren dreamed. There were people in lab coats, and they kept trying to explain how painful the procedure was going to be. He sneered at them. He was used to pain, beyond used to it. Pain was a comfort by now, something he sought out to soothe the restless needs locked inside him. That the procedure was going to be painful did not scare him in the least.

There was no clear memory of the procedure itself or the immediate aftermath, nothing that fit clearly between the sensation of lowering himself into the water and standing in a circle of bodies, drenched in blood with his claws out. There was just pain: pain as soon as the procedure hit, pain spliced with flashes of an invasive feeling in his bones, a feeling of getting turned inside out. Then came the blood--other people’s blood, so much of it on the floor around him, each bright red pool accusing him of carnage. 

And the dog tags around his neck. There was that, too. In his dream, Eren ripped them off his neck and stared down at them; when he read the name ‘Wolverine,’ he woke up.

As soon as he opened his eyes, his body reacted: he was in a white room, on a raised hospital bed, and that sent an immediate signal of danger to both his latent memories of Levi and to the part of him that was still Eren. He was moving on instinct, his body lunging forward while his fist slashed out with claws that he didn’t have. 

Eren breathed. It took his brain several moments to realize why his hand wasn’t sprouting claws: he was Eren Jaeger, not Wolverine--Levi. He didn’t have claws and he didn’t have dog tags and nothing in that dream had actually happened to him.

Eren sat up all the way, clutching at his face. Sweat slicked up his palms from where they touched his forehead, and he felt for a second or two like he might throw up. Then it passed, and he realized there were wires attached to his temples and his chest, plus an IV needle sticking out of his arm.

A greasy dread uncoiled in his stomach. He didn’t recognized this particular room, but that didn’t matter, because he knew where he was, he knew that Grisha had caught him. 

Eren wasted no time yanking the wires off his skin and was only slightly more careful pulling his IV out. It bled, but that wasn’t a concern of his--hell, if he left a blood trail then maybe these fucking scientists would be so distracted by trying to get his DNA that they’d let him escape. 

It had been a big mistake, them leaving him shirtless. Eren’s skin was exposed and he was going to use that against anyone who came after him. 

The room opened up into a silent, futuristic-looking corridor with white walls and metal ceilings. It was eery and made Eren’s skin crawl all the more--he didn’t recognize his surroundings from his brief time in the lab, but this could easily be a wing he hadn’t seen before.

Eren moved, going as quickly and silently as he could. He turned a corner and then nearly collided with someone--he didn't try to stop, not when his goal was to take out anyone who touched him. But instead of touching him and going under, the person neatly sidestepped him by spinning and then propelling themselves off the wall in a high somersault over Eren's head.

And the person was blue. 

"Hi!" They said as they landed behind Eren. Eren whirled, his hands up and out to fight, but his opponent just took a step backwards, grinning.

Now that they weren't a blue blur, Eren could tell that they were covered by a lab coat as well as elbow length gloves. They also had glasses that were strapped on--Eren guessed so they didn’t fall off when the person did somersaults like the stunt they’d just pulled. They seemed female, or at least female shaped: the blue fur on their face made it tough to tell. 

“Whoa, hey there, I’m not here to fight you! Calm down, yeah?" The person (the doctor?) Was grinning nervously, but she wasn't making any kind of move to restrain Eren. 

"Who -- what--" spluttered Eren, still taken aback by the blue fur. 

"I'm guessing you want to know where you are and who I am? That's good, curiosity is good! It's a much better sign to be out of your bed and curious than sick in bed and withdrawn!" The doctor thrust out a hand and when Eren didn't take it, she grabbed his hand anyway, shaking vigorously. "I'm Hanji Zoe, and you're in a school."

"This doesn't look like a school," It looked like something much, much shadier. He dropped Hanji's hand, wondering if her fur would protect her against his power or if that was his best option for escape. “This is Grisha’s lab, isn’t it?”

“Grisha? No clue who that is.” Hanji frowned but then shrugged off Eren’s paranoia. "And the rest of it looks a lot more school-like--this is just the medical wing. We needed to poke and prod at you!" She laughed and her grin was downright maniacal, made more so by her yellow eyes and the tufts of fur framing her jaw. Then the grin faded and she gave Eren a more serious look, like she was trying to peer inside him. 

"We're not sure what was happening between your mind and Levi's when we found you, but you were yelling and it seemed safest to put you under. Then when it became clear that in your unconscious state, you were taking a back seat to Levi's personality in your mind, we thought it was, ah, prudent to keep you under medical observation."

Levi--oh god. “Where is Levi? If you’ve done something to him, I--”

“Levi’s fine,” Hanji said quickly, backing up again as Eren took a step forward. “He’s recovering from what _you_ did to him.”

The fight went out of Eren almost immediately. She was right: if Levi was hurt, or worse, still in a coma, it was his fault entirely. The one person who’d been kind to him, who’d been there for him, and Eren had nearly killed him. 

Even if it had been in self-defense, now that the moment had passed and Eren was no longer flooded with adrenaline and survival instinct, he almost wished that he had just let himself bleed out. He thought of his earlier fantasies about Levi being able to withstand his touch, and wanted to throw up. 

“I’m sorry--I didn’t mean to put that so rudely,” Hanji said. “Levi really is okay. He’s still unconscious, but his vital signs are good and Erwin says that he should be ready to wake up later today.

Eren frowned. “Who’s Erwin?”

“Ah. So do you feel ready to see more than just the medical wing then?”

Eren looked around. This could still be a trick, but he doubted that any of Grisha’s scientists were blue, furry mutants. “Yeah. Show me the rest.” 

“You’ll want to put on a shirt, I’m guessing. Come on.” Hanji started down the hallway, going back the way she she’d come, and Eren followed.


End file.
